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tv   FOX News Sunday With Chris Wallace  FOX News  February 10, 2013 11:00am-12:00pm PST

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bennia minute netanyahu says president obama's trip to israel next month will emphasize the strong ties between got the two countries. netanyahu welcomed obama's visit and says there are three main topics on the leader's agenda. >> the president and i talk about this visit and agree that we will discuss three main issues. iran's arms race. iran's attempts to arm itself with the nuclear weapons and the situation in syria and its implication for the region's security as well as that of israel and the united states, of course. >> and america's toughest sheriff is joining forces with one of america's toughest action stars. arizona sheriff joe arpaio and actor steven segal. more than 3,000 people joined the volunteer positive for salmonella icy. arpaio says itle help deter
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school shooters and won't cost taxpayers a dime. that is all the time we have for us here in washington. "fox news sunday" is coming up next. chris wallace has exclusive interviews with house minority leader nancy pelosi and senator john mccain. you don't want to miss that. i'm unroberts in for -- i'm john roberts in for shannon bream today. have a great rest of our weekend and if you are in new england get to shoveling now before the rain comes in later captioned by closed captioning services, inc. >> chris: i'm chris wallace. what is the state of our union? foreign and domestic? as president obama prepares to address the nation tuesday, he faces a buzzsaw of issues. automatic spending cuts. gun control. immigration reform. and the resurgent al-qaeda.
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we will talk about all this with two of washington's heavy hitters. house democratic leader nancy pelosi. and senator john mccain. pelosi and mccain only on "fox news sunday." then, senators grill the president's nominee for cia director over the targeted killing of terrorist suspects. we will ask our sunday panel about new demands to lift the veil on drone strikes. and our power player of the week can tell you almost everything the president does and how you often he does it. all right now on "fox news sunday." >> chris: and hello again from fox news in washington. when president obama delivers his state of the union is speech tuesday, one big issue will be sequestration. $85 billion in automatic spending cuts due to kick in march 1. the white house now warns this will mean damaging layoffs of
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teachersers law enforcement and food safety inspectors and the pentagon will be hit, too. they propose a mix of spending cuts and, yes, more taxes through limiting deductions for the wealthy. i sat down late friday with house democratic leader nancy pelosi and asked her are about the fast approaching deadline. congress woman pa lo pelosi, we back to "fox news sunday." >> welcome to the capitol. >> the white house says sequestration will have a severe effect on many americans. house republicans agree but say the answer is to find other spending cuts, not tax hikes. >> i would think that sequestration is a bad idea all around. this should be something that is out of the question. the fact is we have had plenty of spending cuts. $1.6 trillion in the budget control act. what we need is growth. we he need growth with jobs. and if you have spending cuts education of our children and other investments like the
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national institutes of health where you are hindering growth you are not delegate t going te deficit. we need more revenue and more cuts. i would like to see that in a big balanced bold proposal. short of that, we must do something to avoid the sequester. >> chris: here is what house speaker boehner said this week. >> at some point, washington, has to deal with its spending problem. i have watched them kick this can down the road for 22 years that i have been here. i have had enough of it. it's time to act. >> chris: congress woman, let's look at the numbers. are you really saying in a government that spends $3.5 trillion a year increased discretionary spending by 14% in the last four years you can't $85 billion to cut to avoid the sequester. >> we have made the cut in terms of agriculture subsidies.
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there are tens of billions of dollars in cuts there. and that should be balanced with eliminating subsidies for big oil. why should we lower pell grants instead of eliminating the subsidies for big oil? >> chris: why not just cut spending. 85 billion north dakota a $3.5 trillion government. >> let's just back up from with all due respect to the speaker what he said is not the gospel truth. the fact is that a lot of the spending increases came during the bush administration. two unpaid for wars that we got ourselves engaged in. prescription drug plan that added enormous amounts to our spending and the tax cuts of the high end that did not create jobs and create revenue coming in. >> chris: but the total debt has increased $5 trillion sense this president came in. >> well, part of that is from the what we had to do to avoid going over the cliff of a recession -- depression.
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yes, we had the recovery act which saved or created 3.5 million jobs. you know the record of job growth in the private sector has been consistent for many record number of months. so again, we have to make a judgment about what -- how do we get growth with jobs. that is where the real revenue comes from. you don't get it by cutting down and cutting education and cutting back on investments in science and national institutes of health, food, safety, you name it. it isn't as much a spending problem as it is a priorities and that is what a budget is. setting priorities. >> chris: but you talk about growth. even kristin chris tee roamer u increase taxes that also hurts growth. >> well, it is about timing. it bass timing. and it is about timing as to when you make cuts as well. we -- >> chris: but the fiscal cliff
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you raise the taxes $650 billion right away. >> yeah. and that was a very good thing to do on people making over the high end in our population. so here is the thing, though. we are here to have a budget that has revenue coming in that has investments made into the future. we also want to make decisions in those two areas where growth with jobs are created because more are jobs more revenue coming in. nothing brings more money to the treasury of the united states than investment in education of the american to recognize that. which cuts really help us and which cuts hurt our future and cuts in education, sigh enfiscal cliff tick research and the rest are harmful and they are what are affected by the sequestration. it is almost a false argument to say we have a spending problem. we have a budget deficit
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problem that we have to address. right now we have low interest on the national debt and it is a good time for us to act to lower that deficit. we think the deficit and the national debt are at immoral levels. we think we must be reduced. we are sick and tired of paying interest on the national debt. that is 15%, a large percentage of the budget the interest on the national debt. it is lower now because of the lower interest rate. >> chris: again all i would say, a $3.5 trillion budget and talking about $85 billion in cuts injuries let's go to the taxes, though. >> before you leave spending we agreed to $1.6 trillion in spending discretionary domestic spending -- >> chris: but the sequestration is just spend ising cuts. >> secondly we have gone to medicare and had savings of over a trillion dollars in medicare already. when i say we i mean the democrats and what the republicans' budgets are proposing is to make a voucher of medicare no longer making it
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a guarantee. there are other things in the discussion that i think the american people made fully aware understand what it means in their are daily lives. >> chris: you keep talking about raising taxes and talk about making the wealthy -- let me ask the question first. let me ask the question. you keep talking about making the wealthy pay their fair share of taxes. >> right. >> chris: the top 1% pay 37% of all federal income taxes. the top 5% pay 59 about percent of all federal taxes. if you took the total income of everyone making more than a million dollars a year and taxed it all at 100% that is only $726 billion which is less than the projected deficit for this year. the bottom line, congress woman is you can't raise taxes enough to solve the deficit problem. >> nobody is saying that we are saying it has to be balanced. now, on the subject of the high end we are not talking about
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raising rates. we did that. we eliminated the high end tax cuts of the bush years which only increased the deficit and didn't create job. we kept the middle income tax cuts. what we have in our proposal that congressman van hollen has put forth the top democrat on the budget committee is to say that we are going to eliminate subsidies. that gives us a lot of money. eliminating the subsidies for big oil. and the budget rule that says all of the high income people -- >> chris: so you are raising taxes on the wealthy. >> you are saying they should pay their fair share which is 30% which is lower than the 39-point of which is the rate, are the bracket they are in. >> chris: if they have a deduction for a home mortgage. >> not take advantage of so many loopholes. >> chris: deductions on the books. >> 30%. >> chris: the point is that you can't raise enough money. i mean the main driver of the
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debt is entitlements. 60% of our budget of our spending is on entitlements. when medicare started life expectancy was 70 and it is now 79. don't you have to raise the eligibility age and slow the growth of benefits? isn't that the way to deal with the deficit? >> i'm glad you brought up medicare because don't you think you should too use your question don't you, don't you think you out to see if raising the age really does save money? those people are not going to evaporate from the face of the earth for two years they will have medical needs and they have to be attended to and the earlier intervention for it the less the cost will be and the better the quality of life. i do think we should subject every federal dollar that is spent to the harshest scrutiny and i do think that the challenge in medicare is not medicare. the challenge is rising medical healthcare costs in it general.
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and prescription drugs and the rest of that that drive those costs. that is what we have to address, which we did in the affordable care act and we are about to receive some reports from then student of medicine about how we -- from the institute of medicine about how we reduce the cost of h healthcare in medicare because we are paying for quality, not quantity of procedures. but quality of performance. and i think that there is money to be saved there. and i don't think it has to come out of benefits for beneficiaries and i don't think you have to raise the age. >> chris: gun control will be a big part of the president's agenda in the state of the union address tuesday night. but i want to ask you about another part of the effort to stop the horrible repeated acts of mass violence. as part of your plan, you called for more sigh enfiscal fick research on the connection between popular culture and violence. we don't need another study respectfully, we know that the
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video games where people have their heads splattered and movies and tv shows. bly don't you go to your friends in hollywood and challenge them, shame them and say knock it off? >> i do think whatever we do because when you talk about evidence-based we have that throughout our proposal. in other words, we don't want to just be anecdoteally writing bills. we want to have the evidence to say -- >> chris: i'm not sure you want to write bills anyway. you have a lot of friends in hollywood. why don't you two to them and puck lickly say i challenge you to stop the video games. >> i do think -- i understand what you are saying, i'm a mother around i'm a grandmother but they -- not they, not hollywood but the evidence says in japan for example they have the most violent games than the rest and the lowest mortality from guns. what is -- i don't know what the explanation is for that except they might have good gun laws. i think that you took one piece of it.
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we are talking about no further sales of assault weapons. what is the justification for an assault weapon, further sales of those? no further sales of the increased capacity, 30 rounds in a gun. we are talking about background checks which is very popular even among gun owners and hunters. we avow the first amendment. we stand with that and say that people have a right to have a gun to protect themselves in it their hopes and their jobs whereever and that they in their work place and that they -- for recreation and hunting and the rest. we are not questioning their right to do that. >> chris: the question is -- i think a lot of people say here it is, liberals like nancy pelosi want to go after gun owners. but they he when it comes to mental health laws and their liberal friends in hollywood they don't want to make them ante up. >> mental health laws i have to
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tell you i was speaker and we couldn't even get a hearing on this. before that we passed the mental health parity act and not affordable care act we took that to the next step and in another year we will have many more services available because of mental health parity. we certainly have to do more and i salute the and applaud all of those who are saying we have to do more in mental health. i think we have to do it all. and that is why we said in -- and we included this there we have to take a look at what these games are. i don't think we should do anything anecdoteally. we have a saying here the plural of anecdote is not data and so we want to know what is the evidence. what will really make a difference here and i think it has to be comprehensive. >> chris: president obama predicted this week that you will onc, once again be speakes words pretty soon.
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what do you think of the spans chances of you being speaker pelosi after the mid terms? >> that is nice that he said that. the fact is what is important that the democrats regain the majority in the house. between now and then we have a lot of work to do. we want to pass comprehensive immigration reform. pass, keep our kids safe and pass some initiatives that relate to gun violence prevention. we want to create jobs and have initiatives where are growth with jobs. we want to make our country more democratic in terms of how elections are conducted, reducing role of money, increasing the level of civility so that more women and young people participate. it is about confidence. confidence in the democracy. confidence in tour children's safety, this confidence in the economy and coonfy dense as to who we are as a people. we have plenty to do before then. but the president said was complimentary but as far as i'm
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concerned it is just about the issues and the issues are better serve ised by a democratic majority in my view and that is what i'm hoping we will achieve in 2014. as said, we have a lot o of work to do hopefully in a bipartisan way between now and then. i think in the issues that i named we could get bipartisan collaboration. >> chris: congress woman pelosi, thank you. >> lovely to see you. >> chris: always a pleasure to talk with you. >> my pleasure, thank you. >> chris: up next, senator john mccain gives us his take on spending cuts, drone strikes, and more. [ woman ] ring. ring. progresso. your soups are so awesomely delicious my husband and i can't stop eating 'em! what's...that... on your head? can curlers! tomato basil, potato with bacon... we've got a lot of empty cans. [ male announcer ] progresso. you gotta taste this soup.
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>> chris: we are back with senator john mccain. senator, welcome. >> thank you, chris. >> chris: you just heard nancy pelosi talk about the automatic spending cuts that kick in on march 1. she wants a mix of cuts and, yes, more taxes, which i know you don't like. on the other hand, if you go to the automatic cuts, sequestration you get a 13% cut over the rest of this year in the pentagon which i know you also don't like. if it comes down to that, higher taxes or sequestration, the pentagon cuts, where do you you go? where do you come down? >> obviously i don't want to see taxes increased but what i would like to see is the president call the leaders over to the white house and say look, we got to solve this problem. this sequestration, secretary panetta, outgoing secretary of defense is one of the most widely respected men or person in washington, d.c. and he has been saying this nationalstate our nation
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security. republicans and democrats are responsible for this new cliff and i will take responsibility tore it for the republicans but we he have got to avoid it. we have got to stop it. >> chris: but if the president says the price of that is more taxes? >> the president is the same one that during the campaign said it's not going to happen. remember that? he just dismissed it. and a lot of us, in fact, lindsey graham and kelly ayotte and i were traveling around the country warning what is going to happen with sequestration. it is devastating. the world is dangerous. i'm sorry i'm a little emotional about this, the men and women in the military deserve better than what we are giving. it we just delayed the deployment of an aircraft carrier. the cuts are coming across the board. the consequences are severe. it requires bipartisanship. would i look at revenue closers? maybe so. but we have already just raised taxes. why do we have to raise taxes
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again? >> chris: in his state of the union speech aides say that the president is going to call for new investment/spending on education and energy and infrastructure and manufacturing to try to boost the economy and to boost the middle class. will you go along with that? >> as long as we pay for it. we have seen this movie before. we saw it with the stimulus pack and. and now a debt and deficit that is $5,000 for every man, woman and -- $51,000 for every man, woman and child in america. the size of the government has grown exponentally. we have a proposal for every three federal retiree we hire only one. that would take care of the sequestration problem. there are simple answers to many of these problems that we can address the problem without raising people's taxes. but first, we ought to sit down
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across the table, the president should with us and try and work this out. all he does is go out and make speeches. >> chris: the president's nominee for cia director, john brennan testified in his confirmation hearing this week, faced tough questioning especially about the administration's targeted killing program for terrorist is suspects even american citizens. what do you think of this idea which is gaining some currency on capitol hill of what is being called a drone court where before the president puts a targeted terrorist especially an american citizen on a kill list they have to go get approval from a judge? >> i don't agree with it. but because i think it an encroachment on the powers of the president of the united states. what we really need to do is take the whole program out of the hands of the central intelligence agency and put it into the department of defense where you have adequate overhe sight. you have committee oversights. you have all of the things that are built in as our oversight of the department of defense. since when is the intelligence
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agency supposed to o be an air force of drones that goes around killing people? i believe it is a job for the department of defense. >> chris: no drone court? >> no. there has to be legitimate oversight by the congress of the united states in the open process as possible and we are in a string conundrum. you can kill avenueover seas but if you capture them in the united states they he have to be read their miranda rights? >> chris: you have been making more news as a questioner than i have. got a surprising admission from secretary of defense panetta and the general of the joint chiefs marten dempsey, they revealed that along with secretary clinton and then director petraeus. >> and now clap. they supported the idea of arming the rebels in syria but
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that the president overruled the entire national security team. what do you make of that and from what we hear from his aides his continued refusal to intervine in the civil war in syria? >> i think they are writing one of the most shameful chapters in american history. 60,000 people have been massacred. i have been to the refugee camps and met the people. the atrocious treatment that is going on. it is disgraceful and there is a national security component. it would be the greatest blow to iran in the last 25 years if bashir assad failed not to mention hezbollah. it is incomprehensible of the president of the united states to say that because people are dying in the congo is a reason not to act in syria shows a lack of experience and knowledge which is dangerous to american national security interests and again it is shameful that we have let over 60,000 people be massacred and we won't even give them arms while the iranians, the iranian
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revolutionary guard on the ground and russians continue to supply weapons. >> chris: then there is the president's nominee to be the new defense secretary former senator chuck hagel at his confirmation hearing i think it is fair to say you gave him a real going over about his opposition about the iraq troop surge in 2007. let's take a look at that. >> were you correct or incorrect? yes, or no. >> my reference to -- >> can you answer the question, senator hagel. the question is were you right or wrong? >> chris: i got a question for you. how are you going to vote on the hagel nomination? >> we still have some more information but again that wasn't an academic discussion i was having with senator hagel. we were losing the war in 2006 and when the president came around president bush who i had been very critical of came around and sent david petraeus and the surge we succeeded in iraq. now, because of the obama administration actions afterwards we are losing and
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badly unraveling. the fact is if we hadn't done that more american lives would have been lost unnecessarily. so for then senator hagel to say well, he will let history be the judge. he was there and involved and i'm sure he is wrong and he knows he is wrong on the basis of the facts of what happened. >> chris: so i got to press it again. because you saw the hearing. you know his record. are you going to support him for defense secretary? >> i will see the rest of the answers to his questions but i have very grave concerns. >> chris: grave concerns. fair to say you are leaning against voting for him? >> i think that would be fair. >> chris: how do you feel about other republican senators who are suggesting some procedural move to block the nomination? >> i think we need all of the information from senator hagel but the fact is we have never filibustered a cabinet appointee and that is why i do not believe we should filibuster his nomination. >> chris: or a hold or one of those other -- >> i think we need some more
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information on questions that he hasn't answered but and i hope those questions get answered. we never filibustered a presidential cabinet appointee and i don't think we should start here. elections have consequences unfortunately. >> chris: you know. >> there you go. >> chris: finally, immigration. you are part of a bipartisan group of senators, 8, four republicans and four democrats who have come up not with legislation but outlines of a plan for immigration reform. the president wants to put the 11 million illegals who are here now on the path to citizenship and secretary of homeland security napolitano said this week she believes the border is her words the boarder is secure. you on the other hand your group are talking about linking the path to citizenship to a number of measures to further enforce the border. question, will you insist in any immigration package on border enforcement first?
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>> yes, i will. that is basically the agreement. there are 11 million people living in the shadows. the children who -r were brougt here when they were children deserve that kind of consideration as well. we do need to have a secure border and can do it with surveillance and other capabilities and i believe we can achieve that. that is our commitment and i owe it to the people who live in the southern part of my state where drug smugglers are coming across their port every single night. >> chris: under your plan although they wouldn't get the path to citizenship until you got the border certification they he would almost immediately get what is called proationary legal status which means this he could continue to live in the country legally. some of the critics on the right are saying that is amnesty? >> i don't think it is amnesty to start with. second of all, what do you want to do with them? and that is the question response. and third of all, it is a tough
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path to citizenship. got to pay back taxes and learn english and have a clear record. you have to get the back of the line behind other people who have come here legally or even waiting legally. so i just reject that. but i i understand how emotional this issue is with many of my friends on both left and right but i think we are making progress and we have not come to final agreement on many of the details some of which you just asked me about. >> chris: senator mccain thanks for coming in today. somehow you always find yourself at the center of the action. >> thank you, my friend. >> chris: up next, the president's big state of the union speech. we will ask our panel about the president's second term agenda and whether congress will pass it. i wanted to call on a few people. ashley, ashley marshall... here. since we're often all on the move, ashley suggested we use fedex office to hold packages for us.
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great job. [ applause ] thank you. and on a protocol note, i'd like to talk to tim hill about his tendency to use all caps in emails. [ shouting ] oh i'm sorry guys. ah sometimes the caps lock gets stuck on my keyboard. hey do you wanna get a drink later? [ male announcer ] hold packages at any fedex office location.
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the current republican plan puts the burden of avoiding those cuts mainly on seniors and middle class families. they would rather ask more from the vast majority of americans and put our recovery at risk than close even a single tax loophole that benefits the wealthy. >> chris: president obama previewing his state of the union address tuesday as he criticized the republican alternative to the automatic spending cuts that kick in march 1. it is time for the sunday group. bill kristol of the weekly standard. liz marlantes from the christian science monitor. republican congressman tom
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cotton of arkansas and fox news political analyst juan williams. we heard from senator mccain and congressman pelosi in the first half about how they think that the sequestration should be resolved. bill, a number of congressional republicans say if there is no compromise and one of the big issues is going to be the democratic demand for more taxes we should just live with the $85 million in automatic spending cuts that kick in march 1. you disagree with that? >> i think the sequester is terrible public policy and charles krauthammer said in it his column on friday. on the other hand they should embrace the sequester because it gives them leverage over president obama. i think it is too dangerous. the president should be responsible and put forward a serious plan to deal with it and republicans should put forward a serious plan to deal with it. they passed good legislation last year and shadufs again this year and say what should
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you could about the sequester. you can't sit back and say the president's proosal from two years ago we wash our hands of it and let your national defenses be gutted. >> chris: liz, it is interesting. with the fiscal cliff at the start of the year the president had all of the leverage because if congress did nothing everybody got a tax increase the rich as well as the middle class. do republicans have the leverage now you because if they he donning if congress does nothing than the $85 billions in automatic spending cuts kick in? >> that is what they are saying. i'm not entirely sure that that is true in the sense that i think that republicans still risk being blamed more if it goes through and things go badly if the economy takes a big hit because of it. based on all of the polling and the way this argument has been shaped and frankly because they are just at such a disadvantage with messaging. obama has been out there really driving this argument. i think the republican party would probably take the bigger hit, you know, boehner is trying hard and calling it the
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obama-questering and trying to pin this on the president. right now the way the politics stand they may he have leverage in the sense they have an opportunity to get spending cuts but may take a serious political hit because of it if they go through with it. >> chris: congressman cotton i want you to react to that. once again, the president is trying to make republicans pay the price politically. basically saying these cuts are going to affect the middle class and education and law enforcement and food inspectors. and, once again, you guys want to protect your wealthy friends from any tax increase. >> chris, the bigger risk i think is the way they will impact the defendant of defense. cutting almost 10% of the department of defense budget this year. that is after four years where the department of defense has been the one agency in the federal government h hasn't had hundreds of billions of dollars stuffed into its budget. look at the domestic spend and
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annual resolutions funding the glove is a lot more fat to cut there. republicans proposed a responsible alternative to the sequester which was proposed in 2011 which shift the cuts away from the department of defense and to domestic spending to ensure that we have two aircraft carriers in persian gulf which we just stopped because of the sequester. >> you heard nancy pelosi and the president there saying if we kill the sequester then you are going to have to have some tax increases not to raising rates but through closing loopholes and ending some of the deductions. are you willing to go along with that? >> i disagree with the call for more tax increases. we increased taxes by over $600 billion last month. we can't keep increasing taxes every month just because barack obama wants more welfare spending. >> chris: juan? >> you said there is too many
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cuts on edens fund want to protect defense from additional cuts. defense is going to suffer 8% of the cuts versus -- >> chris: 13% because it kicks in in march as opposed to last fall. >> 7.9% for defense versus 4% for nondefense or domestic spending. if that is the case, congressman, i think republicans have to take a responsible posture. even think back to mitt romney said we can close loopholes and do away with the deductions and nancy pelosi talking to chris wallace this morning pointed to ben sits and subsidies for the oil and gas industry in the country. unnecessary farm subsidies. there is an overwhelming census on capitol hill a lot of those can be done away. why not work with the president to avoid sequestration that you say would be draconian. >> why not just cancel the defense cuts. >> you strike a deal and may make the democrats. >> this is not a matter of
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politics. this is going to gut our defenses. you don't have to save $45 billion this year. that is 4% of the deficit. we will endanger the national defenses and short change the service men and women overseas for the sake of cutting 4% from the deficit? it is totally irresponsible. >> bill is right that you captain have massive tax reform in just 60 days. it took ronald reagan and tip o'neill and bill bradley a bipartisan bill in 1986, 20 montes to do it. there is things like nascar track owners and wind energy producer and port rehe can rum manufacturers that would more than offset the defense cuts that would be devastating. >> bill wants the president to bail out republicans who made the sequestration deal. >> i want the president to bail out the military. >> but he wants to. >> he is commander in chief. maybe you are not aware of that. >> he is saying let's have a temporary deal to avoid sequestration and republicans are saying no, we have got to protect the rich oil companies and gas companies and we can't do it.
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>> chris: i will call a little bit of a change here and congressman cotton i want to ask you about an interesting decision that the congressional republican leaders made they decide who is going to give the official republican response and decided itle be florida senator marco rubinetterie giving the official response. >> i would say he has been an emerging leader on capitol hill for are republicans across the country for two years now. a generation of new leaders not just marco but paul ryan and scott walker who are emerging and will be the leaders of the party going forward and marco is a great impassionate advocate for limited government and strong national defense and limited -- >> chris: let me ask you to wrap this up. as someone who wante wanted mao rubio to run last year?
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how big of a difference. >> i'm not sure he is at the top. he will give the response and tom can give the response next year and we will have the rubio cotton ticket in 2016. >> chris: when this guy talks we listen. all right, panel, we have to take a break here. we we come back some members of congress demand new checks on the president's power to launch drone strikes.
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it was a limited covert pro gram. now, everybody knows about it. and i think we need to see that this program is really run according to the american
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constitution. >> chris: senator dianne feinstein suggesting creation of a secret drone court where the president would have to go to get approval before putting terror suspects on his kill list and we are back now you with the panel. congressman cotton for people who don't know you, you are kind of an interesting figure. went to harvard. went to harvard law school and then spent five years on active duty on the frontlines in iraq and afghanistan. a lot of credibility on both sides of the issue. how do you feel about the idea before the president could target someone for aas nation especially an american citizen he would have to go ahead approval for a judge. >> we don't need federal judges involved in sensitive and national security matters and it would be an unconstitutional infringement on the president's authority to keep americans
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safe. you shouldn't be surprised in america reaches out and exacts justice against you if you take up on the frontlines with terrorists. >> chris: some say senator obama blasted george w. bush for waterboarding and for a lack of transparency about the legal documents that authorized him to do that and yet the fact is that president obama had to be dragged into releasing the legal authorization for his decision to kill people. >> i think there are two kind of schools of thoughts in terms of the hypocrisy argument. one is that obama himself when became president you see -- you get different briefings and see a different side of the story than you did when you were a candidate and sometimes that changes your mind and makes you think that the policies might be necessary. the republicans have been claiming hypocrisy against democrats all week on this.
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to some extent that is true if this were the bush administration there would be a larder hugh and cry about this. polls show that the democrats are okay with the pregram. there is the left and where the majority of democratic voters are. most voters, most obama voters out there are thinking well, you know, if this is the kind of program that can avoid another iraq, great, you know, i think that is fine. and that also i think gives cover to the administration's positioning on this. >> chris: bill, we also got some fascinating revealations from that senate hearing with defense secretary panetta this week and talked about what he revealed about syria but he said that on o the night of the benghazi attack, is september 11th of this last year, that he and general dempsey spoke to the president once early on and then never again. let's take a look. >> did the president show any
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curiosity but what kind of asset dos you have helping these people? did he make that phone call? >> there is no question in my mind that the president of the united states was concerned about american lives. >> i don't believe that is a credible statement if he never called and asked you are we helping these people. >> chris: given that and it was a series of attacks but the overall action went on over the course of 7 hours in benghazi the night of september 11th what do you make of that? >> i think it is genuinely shocking. the president, leon panetta walked out of the ohville office at 5:30 that night after a previously scheduled meet. briefed the president what was happening and an american ambassador was missing and assumed could well be sustained or ongoing attack. the president never spoke to them the rest of that night and never spoke to the white house later that night. not as though he talked to the
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chief of staff and conveyed a message to or from the president. the president seems to have checked out. spent on hour that evening on the phone with the israeli prime minister netanyahu because of the flap about israel at the convention the week before and he wanted for political reasons to show he was in touch. they did a reidout. they are busy talk together israeli prime minister and doing a readout of the call for the press and not talking to panetta and done lin is not talking to panetta and it is a dereliction of duty. not only didn't the president talk to any one did they talk to the secretary of defense or say do what you can and totally checked out for that evening and then the next morning the president goes off to las vegas for the fundraiser. >> not just shocking. outrageous as well. and shows his lack of preparation to be the commander in it chief and lead troops when they are in combat. you mentioned i was in the army. at fort benning where i spent a year you are learning the 8
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step troop leading procedures. step 8 is not issue an order. step 7 is issue the order. step 8 is supervise. he staid in september i issued a directive to take whatever steps are necessary to protect troops and assets and then never followed up and never asked is my directive being executed. that is the essence of leadership and this is a complete failure of leadership. >> chris: i don't know and bill raises a legitimate question. maybe he was doing it through the national security advisor. >> what they said in the case there was no further contact from the white house and the president show nod curiosity at all. had a conversation with prime minister netanyahu that was in the middle of a political season when was receiving political criticism for not being engaged with the prime minister and then preparing to fly off to las vegas the next day for a fundraiser. when i was in afghanistan and we had troops in contact i was next to the radio monitoring that at all times. when the president has troops in contact in an embassy he
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knows is insecure that has to be the first priority. >> i'm listening to one side of the conversation. it is not wrong but it is not complete. what is complete is that secretary panetta said these were two attacks that took place. secondly, the military was not positioned to respond and help. they did not have sufficient intelligence about a forth coming attack. this is exactly what the secretary said. you have an attack. the president said i want my people protected take all necessary steps to protect americans at risk and put his people in place to do that job. his people were doing that job. i don't know why the president would suddenly have to not only, sir, sum vent but then super cede the authority of everybody in the line of authority. i guess you are picking on the president. just doesn't seem real to me. >> winston churchill said the essence is always right to probe. the president has shown his willing isness to do this when
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in 2009 they proposed 40,000 troops to go to afghanistan the president pressed and reduced it to 32,000 without good reason. if they said this night we have this six hour rule and we can't get asset there's. he could have said we don't have ship is off the shore or helicopters. >> i guess that indicates you don't have much trust in secretary about panetta and clinton alike. i guess the president having appointed him thinks these are good people who care about american assets and american life and especially the life of an ambassador. i mean it is just like the syria situation we are discussion here. in the syria situation the president did follow up and did the due diligence you spoke of congressman and said there is a question of do the arms fall into the possession of the wrong group, maybe some terrorists. >> chris: i have to stop for a very good reason which you will see in a second. i thank you all and we will see you all next week. i have to make a bitter sweet announcement i have been
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dreading. our executive producer and leader is retiring today. >> one of the originals here. he put tony snow and "fox news sunday" on the air almost 17 years ago. even before there was a fox news channel. over the years he was in charge as we interviewed four presidents. he was in charge during our political coverage and big special events. and we couldn't keep him away when we interviewed his favorite quarterback. >> isn't that the truth. in case you are wondering when we go to break late in the show, go ahead, show the picture. that is marty on the back row. wave, marty. there he is. the guy with the silver hair. i will think i gave him some of those and, yes, he is this charge. i will miss him dearly and so will the program. mart. no one ever deserved to put his feet up and relax more than you do. up next, our power player of the week. anyone have occasional constipation, diarrhea, gas, bloating? yes! one phillips' colon health probiotic cap each day
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numbers help tell the story in an important way. >> i'm going to call on mark, there you are. >> mr. president. >> a number of white house correspondent is talking about a
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meticulous records he keeps on almost everything he keeps the president does. >> you think we're exaggerating. >> the number of speeches. did he use a teleprompter. how long did the speech run. how many times has he been there before. number of flights on air force one. number of flights on marine one. >> chris: we squeezed in the cramped booth where he showed us his file on each of the 114 rounds of golf he has played. >> i keep a log, what date did he play. how long did he play it. who was in the four some. >> chris: you love this stuff, don't you? >> at least i have an aspect of the presidency that pretty much i own. i like that. >> chris: and he does own it. his colleagues come to him to find out how many news conferences the president has held. when national security advisor
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tom donlin was briefing reporters on the summit last year he deferred to nolan. >> it's risky to do this with historian mark nolan in the room. i'll do it anyway at the risk of being corrected immediately. >> how do you feel to be unofficial records keeper of the presidency? >> it certainly isn't what i set out to do but i guess i'm artificial. >> he started in the clinton administration when he noticed the president kept going to california. >> i tried going back to reconstruct how many trips he had made to california and it took all day. >> so he noller started keeping his own records. he spends each day logging the president's activity. when he reported george w. bush had spent more than a year at his texas ranch, it came up at a white house christmas party. >> i came up